


Just Another Autumn

by JoyAndOtherStories



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale tries to help him feel better, Both of them are clueless, Canon Compliant, Crowley doesn't like Autumn, Did I mention they're both clueless, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Post-Canon, Touch-Starved Aziraphale (Good Omens), Touch-Starved Crowley (Good Omens), definitely not a one-shot, this was supposed to be a one-shot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-12-16 18:38:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21040892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoyAndOtherStories/pseuds/JoyAndOtherStories
Summary: He’d gone six millennia circling around the angel, barely ever touching, and that had been fine.Well, mostly fine. Probably not at all fine, but at any rate, it wasn’t that the desire hadn’t been there, but…well, he hadn’t really let himself feel it. But then Aziraphale had taken his hand on the bus from Tadfield to London, all exhaustion and relief and new-growing terror over what their respective sides might do next, and even though he knew it had just been the desire to hold on to a friend when everything else had slid away and come undone, something had awoken and refused to go back to sleep. The something ranged from a persistently mewing kitten to a starved, roaring lion—he’d tried for a snake metaphor, because that seemed more fitting for him, but frankly, snakes were a good bit easier to manage than whatever this was. Whatever this was needed near-constant supervision.





	1. Just a Tartan Blanket

**Author's Note:**

> OH NOOO This was supposed to be a one-shot

Crowley had never liked Autumn.

Well, he didn’t mind Halloween, at least not when it was properly spooky. Big spooky fan, him. But honestly, humans these days seemed intent on moving Halloween as far away from properly spooky as they could. Costumes, once meant to inspire terror, now seemed geared toward giving children a chance to parade about looking _sweet_. Or _cute_. Devil costumes were possibly his least favorite—frankly insulting, seeing children wearing what was supposed to be _him_, with floppy padded red horns, tails with a pointless triangle on the end, big sappy eyes. Or, even worse, adults, in what were meant to be _sexy _versions. Every time he saw one, his brain automatically placed someone like Hastur in it, which was much more terrifying than anything the humans had come up with.

Besides, he, Crowley, looked plenty sexy without needing a garish costume.

But in any case, Halloween was the least of his problems with Autumn.

Autumn was supposed to be about death and decay and inescapable reminders of your own mortality (for humans, anyway). And instead, the humans had made it about sentimentally cheery colors and crackling fires and pumpkins. _Cheerful _pumpkins.

And pumpkin _spice_, which didn’t have anything to do with pumpkins, and suddenly became omnipresent at some mysteriously agreed-upon date, creeping ever-earlier each year.

And it was cold.

The weather, not the pumpkin spice. (Unless it was in ice cream or iced coffee or mayonnaise or whatever, but that wasn’t the point.)

The point—the point was, in theory, his corporation could be any temperature he wanted it to be, but somehow the cold of Autumn seeped in, chilled his hands and feet, numbed his nose, made him shiver. Maybe it was a holdover from his snake form—he wasn’t _actually _cold-blooded (or he was fairly sure he wasn’t; biology wasn’t exactly his strong suit, so he supposed he could have been), but self-warming wasn’t something his corporation did easily. Maybe it was the transition away from the heat of summer; perhaps he was slower to acclimate than…well, than humans. Or than Aziraphale. There wasn’t really anyone else to compare to. You’d think, after several centuries of living in a climate with a definite Autumn, he’d have gotten used to it, but no, every year his body apparently had to learn all over again, and—

“You do realize you’ve told me all of this every Autumn for at least the last decade,” Aziraphale said over the rim of a mug of some sort of pumpkin-spiced cider that Crowley had brought him from a café around the corner. The angel, in his soft cardigan, was seated neatly on his couch, an Autumn-colored tartan blanket tucked around his legs, a book in the hand that wasn’t holding the mug. Aziraphale was made for Autumn. Or possibly vice versa. “Besides, wasn’t pumpkin spice one of yours?”

Crowley grumbled. Aziraphale knew perfectly well that he’d taken credit in Hell for pumpkin spice (convincing half the humans to spend more than they could afford on sugary drinks, while giving the other half something to sanctimoniously criticize, was worth at least a congratulatory memo). What he would never have admitted to Hell, and certainly not to the angel, was that he’d done it because he knew Aziraphale would enjoy the new taste combinations, just like he’d prompted somebody-or-other centuries ago to start importing cocoa. He couldn’t have predicted that the humans would invent abominations like pumpkin-spice hummus and pumpkin-spice canned meat.

“Are you about to give me your speech about evil containing the seeds of its own destruction?” he asked snidely, stopping his pacing for a moment and shoving his cold hands in his pockets.

“I was going to say ‘ingredients’ of its own destruction this time,” Aziraphale said, the kindly face gone all sardonic in the way he reserved for Crowley. “Seemed more fitting.”

“Eck,” said Crowley, flinging an arm around to express his disgust, “that’s…that’s…”

“For Heaven’s sake, Crowley, just sit down with a blanket if you’re cold,” Aziraphale interrupted this display of eloquence. “There’s plenty of room on the couch.”

Crowley froze in a way that had nothing to do with the temperature.

It wasn’t as though they hadn’t shared furniture before.

They’d shared the bench in St. James Park for decades now. And they’d been sitting together on the bus, on the rare occasions they used the bus instead of the Bentley, in the month or two since Armageddidn’t.

But had Aziraphale ever _invited _Crowley to share a couch? His own couch, in his own bookshop?

_You’re reading too much into this_, he told himself firmly.

“You’ve got the blanket,” he told Aziraphale, to cover his too-long pause.

Aziraphale rolled his eyes. “There are at least three blankets in arm’s reach for you right now,” he pointed out. “Besides, you don’t like Autumn, so why would you want this one?”

He wanted that one because Aziraphale was under it, and—

He couldn’t let himself think about that. He couldn’t let himself _feel _that.

He’d gone six millennia circling around the angel, barely ever touching, and that had been _fine_.

Well, mostly fine. Probably not at all fine, but at any rate, it wasn’t that the desire hadn’t been there, but…well, he hadn’t _really _let himself feel it. But then Aziraphale had taken his hand on the bus from Tadfield to London, all exhaustion and relief and new-growing terror over what their respective sides might do next, and even though he _knew _it had just been the desire to hold on to a friend when everything else had slid away and come undone, something had awoken and refused to go back to sleep. The _something _ranged from a persistently mewing kitten to a starved, roaring lion—he’d tried for a snake metaphor, because that seemed more fitting for him, but frankly, snakes were a good bit easier to manage than whatever this was. Whatever this was needed near-constant supervision.

It was all he could do to keep from reaching for Aziraphale all the time, and he had to keep himself from that, because realistically, Aziraphale showed no signs of reaching for him. Not in _that _way.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale’s voice broke into his thoughts, and he barely kept himself from starting guiltily. “Are you quite alright?”

“Told you, I don’t like Autumn,” he mumbled vaguely, trying to look as though he’d been attempting to choose between the three easily-in-arm’s-reach blankets.

A moment later, Aziraphale, who’d looked as though he’d permanently taken root on the couch, was somehow on his feet. Behind him, the Autumn-tartan blanket was neatly layered next to his cushion, book and mug arranged precisely on the end table.

“Sit,” he said, taking Crowley’s elbow and guiding him firmly to the couch.

Crowley sat.

Aziraphale whisked the nearest blanket (not Autumn-themed, just his usual tartan pattern) off the arm of a chair. For a wild moment, his arm still tingling from where the angel had touched him, Crowley thought Aziraphale was going to tuck the blanket in around him, but of course that was wishful thinking. Aziraphale instead handed him the blanket, looking away nervously, and quickly retreated to his own end of the couch.

“Is that better?” Aziraphale asked, having ensconced himself again under his own blanket as if he’d never moved.

Crowley drew his knees up to his chest and tucked the blanket around himself, keeping several very solid feet of space between him and the angel. Somewhere between feeling terrified, feeling utterly exhilarated, being deeply annoyed with himself for feeling terrified, and being even more annoyed with himself for feeling exhilarated, what came out of his mouth was, “Ehh, it’s not really my color.”

Aziraphale blinked at him, something hurt crossing his face before he replied, predictably, “Tartan is stylish. And warm, in this case.”

“Alright, alright, it’s warm,” sighed Crowley. He gave a little shiver for effect.

“Something hot to drink, perhaps?” Aziraphale suggested, watching him. “I could make us some cocoa.”

“Maybe later,” answered Crowley, not because he didn’t want any but because the kitten in his chest was thoroughly awake and mewing insistently, if by “kitten” he meant “largish bobcat” and if by “mewing insistently” he meant “prowling the edges of its cage when it’s nearly mealtime,” and he wasn’t sure if he could keep it contained if Aziraphale came close enough to hand him a drink.

“Well,” said Aziraphale. “Alright, then.” He pressed his lips together, and Crowley had a vague sense through all the other senses tumbling through him that he might have missed something important.


	2. Just a Mug of Cocoa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aziraphale is branching out. Just about cocoa, of course. Nothing else. Not at all.

Crowley still didn’t like Autumn.

It was always—

Wait, where was he?

It wasn’t that he didn’t know where he was; obviously he would always know the bookshop. He was still on the couch in the back room, also a location he was familiar with (very). He’d watched Aziraphale read and sip his cider for as long as he could before it caught the angel’s attention, then he’d pulled out his mobile and pretended to “watch the You-Tube.” At some point he must have drifted off. That was fine, wasn’t it? He’d woken up in the bookshop before. Admittedly it usually involved being much less sober, but it wasn’t unheard of, especially in the weeks since they’d stopped the Apocalypse (well, played an important part in stopping the Apocalypse. ...well, at least a supporting role).

So what was different?

He was pleasantly drowsy, his thoughts moving at a very sleepy, leisurely pace, which was why it took several more moments for him to realize that the difference was in how _warm _he felt.

Not merely warm; _cocooned_.

He forced his sleep-addled brain to take vaguely better stock of his current position. Somehow he’d gone from folded into one corner of the couch to stretched fully down the length of it. Aziraphale’s tartan blanket was stretched down the length of _him_, and was evidently the reason for the luxurious warmth enveloping him.

Wait—Aziraphale’s blanket. Aziraphale. Aziraphale had been—Crowley frowned at the end of the couch farthest from his head. There had definitely been a plump, autumnal angel, peering through pointless spectacles, seated approximately where his feet were now.

“’Ziraphale?” he mumbled.

“Ah, good morning, dear boy,” came the familiar voice, _much _too brightly. Crowley twisted sideways; there was the angel, still bespectacled, cardiganned, and blanketed, still holding a book, but now tucked into his faded chair instead of sharing the couch with Crowley. Crowley felt an entirely irrational pulse of loneliness.

“Fell asleep,” he said, observantly.

“Yes, you certainly did,” Aziraphale agreed. “I didn’t want to disturb you; you looked terribly peaceful.” His voice was horrendously chipper, and he was giving Crowley that fond look that he was now, post-Nonmageddon, free to give him openly. Neither of these did anything to un-muddle Crowley’s head.

“Warm,” Crowley said, insightfully.

“Ah,” said the angel, fidgeting, “well. I hope you don’t mind; I might have been a bit…presumptuous. It’s just that I was afraid you’d get cold, once you’d stretched out. The blanket was rather sliding off, you see, so I…er…put it back in place and, well, miracled it to stay warm.” His expression was flickering between “pleased with himself” and “unaccountably nervous.”

Crowley was too sleepy for it at the moment, but some part of his brain filed away the fact that Aziraphale had tucked a blanket around him and _he’d slept through it _to be outraged about later. Currently, though, he was still working through the idea that all this warmth surrounding him was…his angel’s blanket. His angel’s miracle.

The mewing creature in his chest helpfully presented him with an image of Aziraphale himself as his heated blanket.

“Bugger off,” he muttered.

“I beg your pardon?”

“No—sorry—not you—sorry, angel. ‘M not awake yet.” He squinted at Aziraphale, whose hurt look hadn’t fully faded. “I like the blanket. ‘S nice.”

This was ludicrously understated—in fact he thought he might never take the blanket off—but it seemed to mollify Aziraphale.

“Were you…planning to continue sleeping?” Aziraphale asked delicately.

Crowley stretched, carefully, so as not to disturb the blanket. There was nothing he could imagine that he’d like better than to stay on his angel’s couch, wrapped up in his angel’s blanket and his angel’s warmth, drifting back to sleep if he pleased. Well…there were several things he’d like better, but as none of them were likely to be options in the foreseeable future, this would suffice (as he firmly told the creature in his chest, which was contemplating getting up for more prowling).

“Could do,” he admitted aloud.

Aziraphale looked faintly disappointed, and it occurred to Crowley, very slowly, that the angel might be politely hinting that it was about time he cleared out.

“Eugghh,” he said, flopping himself into something closer to a sitting position, keeping the blanket drawn up to his chin (cold air trickling in uncomfortably around his back), “don’t have to. Could…could go. If you want.” He sounded pitiful even to himself, but the thought of his cold, sterile flat, and himself alone there, no blanket, no angel, was something he was distressingly unwilling to face.

“No, I didn’t say that,” Aziraphale replied quickly. “As a matter of fact, I was rather hoping we could go to breakfast. There’s a new little place around the corner; I’ve been hearing a great many things—”

Crowley lost track of what Aziraphale was saying about the new restaurant in his sleepy relief that he didn’t have to go to his flat. It shouldn’t have bothered him so much; he did live there, after all—albeit as little as possible over the past month or so—

Aziraphale was looking at him expectantly. What had he missed? He mentally rewound the angel’s monologue—

“Oh—‘course I want to, angel. Breakfast. Let’s go.”

Unfortunately, this meant he had to emerge from the blanket, a process which bordered on painful, although he did his best to suppress his shivers so that Aziraphale wouldn’t start fussing.

Although, come to think of it, he wouldn’t _mind _Aziraphale fussing over him, especially if it involved Aziraphale’s soft hands holding…

_Stop it_, he told himself, heading for the door.

Oh.

It was still Autumn.

Aziraphale, warm round body wrapped in several layers of clothing, beamed cheerily at the gusts of wind that blew cold, shriveled leaves around their feet. Crowley, thinly-covered bones draped in clinging stuff that was supposed to set off his hips, grumpily buttoned a few more shirt buttons than usual. It didn’t help.

“Why’d we have to live in England?” he was complaining by the time they reached the restaurant. “Practically in the Arctic Circle. Rains all the time, dark by mid-afternoon in the winter—”

“Crowley, you _like _the dark,” Aziraphale pointed out.

“That’s not the point—”

They paused while Aziraphale ordered for both of them. Crowley got distracted by the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled. His resident kitten started mewing about how nice it would be to kiss that spot, to brush it with his fingers in the morning…

“What were you saying, my dear?” Aziraphale turned back to him, leaning in with his hand on the table, the way he did now. Crowley cast about for a topic.

“Crows!” he decided.

Aziraphale frowned at him perplexedly. “What?”

“Crows. Some sort of bird, anyway. They hibernate. No…not hibernate, the other thing.”

“Incubate their eggs?”

“No, the other thing they do in the winter.”

“Migrate?” suggested Aziraphale.

“Right, that one. They leave when it’s cold, go somewhere warm. See, that’s smart. We should go somewhere warm in the winter.”

“I really don’t think crows migrate,” Aziraphale objected. The conversation meandered on from there. Crowley wasn’t bothered about where it went, as long as he could watch the angel—and he _could_, now, and could smile while he did it, if he liked. No need for excuses, no coaxing, no thwarting, no scheming to stop an apocalypse. Just breakfast, and smiling at the way Aziraphale savored every crumb of his pastries, and Aziraphale _smiling back at him_.

It was almost enough to make him forget how much he wanted to take that hand the angel left so temptingly on the table—

Enough of that.

It _was _enough to make him forget about Autumn, until they stepped outside after they’d finished (specifically after Aziraphale had finished; Crowley had stopped nibbling and passed his dish on to the angel some time before)—

“Bollocks,” he swore, crossing his arms defensively against a cold breeze that completely ignored the jacket he’d manifested.

“You know, there’s nothing actually stopping you from wearing additional clothing,” Aziraphale remarked.

“You’re the one who wears layers, not me.” Crowley tried forcing his hands into his skin-tight pockets.

“Yes,” Aziraphale agreed. “I’m also the one who’s warm.”

By the time they reached the bookshop, Crowley was legitimately shivering. Aziraphale looked him up and down with that particular blend of exasperation and fondness that only he could produce, and that he only used for Crowley, and opened the door for him.

“After you, my dear.”

Once inside, Aziraphale again took him by the elbow and installed him on the couch, handing him the blanket.

“And no more of this ‘maybe later’ nonsense,” he told Crowley firmly. “I’m making cocoa. I won’t have you moping about all cold and miserable; it’s very distracting.” He tucked a stray corner of the blanket around Crowley’s shoulder, not quite touching him. Crowley froze; Aziraphale backed away as if he’d been caught trespassing and bustled off to his cocoa supplies. By the time he returned, Crowley had just had time to stop tingling and to convince the creature in his chest to downgrade from urgent prowling to a sort of irritated strolling.

This progress was demolished instantly when the angel brought him his mug (just like Aziraphale’s white winged one, but black), both hands cupped around it—Crowley took it as gingerly as he could, but there was no way to avoid the brush of their hands. He swallowed and focused on the small pile of marshmallows Aziraphale had added, not looking up until the angel had sat again on the far end of the couch.

Aziraphale was watching Crowley nervously.

Nervously?

Why on Earth would he be nervous?

Crowley took a sip of the cocoa, negotiating around the marshmallows, to give himself time to consider this.

“Oh!” he said involuntarily. He sent a rare blink in Aziraphale’s direction. “You spiked it.”

“I—well, I thought I’d branch out a bit,” said Aziraphale, his eyes still waiting for Crowley’s reaction. “Do you like it?”

“Of course,” he answered, automatically but also accurately. He took a slower taste. His palette was well known for not being especially sophisticated, but he could easily tell that the angel had put some preparation into this. It was rich and creamy, with just enough alcohol to warm but not sting. “It’s…” He sighed, rolled his eyes. “Scrumptious.”

“Oh,” said Aziraphale, startled, “oh, thank you.” He shone his beaming smile on Crowley, who wasn’t sure if it was that or the augmented cocoa that was warming him so thoroughly. Either way, he could have basked in it all day; he’d possibly never been this content in 6000 years—

_Stop it_, he told the creature in his chest, which was growling greedily as he watched Aziraphale’s lips sipping from the angel-winged mug.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know what Aziraphale puts in his augmented cocoa, but if it were me, I'd add Kahlua and Irish cream. Happy weekend, everyone!


End file.
